Statement of Faith

Statement of Faith

“Moreover, brethren, I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received and in which you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast that word which I preached to you – unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.”

–From the Apostle Paul’s first letter to the church of God at Corinth

God | The Bible | Man’s Creation and Fall | Election | The Person and Work of Christ | The Holy Spirit and Salvation | God’s Covenants and The Law | The Church | Christ’s Return
God

1) We believe that there is but one true and living Goda, eternally existent in three Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spiritb, all having the same attributes and qualities, yet so as there are not three gods, but onec–each having the whole of the divine essence, yet distinct from one another so that the persons are not to be confused nor the substance divided; and that this God is invisibled, personale, omnipresentf, eternalg, dependent on noneh, unchangingi, truthfulj, trustworthyk, almightyl, sovereignm, omniscientn, righteouso, holyp, goodq, lovingr, mercifuls, long-sufferingt, and graciousu.

2) We believe that God has revealeda all that is necessary to life and salvationb in the sixty-six books of Holy Scripture which are the written word of Godc; that all Scripture was given by the inspiration of Godd, is infallible and inerrant in the original autographs as represented by the best Greek & Hebrew manuscriptse, and is the final arbiter in all disputesf — its authority being derived from its Authorg and not from the opinions of menh.

3) We believe that God, by His powerful worda, freely created the universeb out of nothingc in six daysd and continues to sustaine and rule over it even nowf; that as the pinnacle of His creationg, He made our first father Adam in His own imageh, sinless, and uprighti; that He appointed Adam head and representative of the whole human racej; and that He thereby made all Adam’s offspring liable to the effects of Adam’s obedience or disobedience to His commandmentk.

a) Gen. 3:1-7; Hos. 6:7.
b) Gen. 2:17, cf. 3:8-12; Rom. 5:12-17, by the transgression of the one the many died; 1 Cor. 15:22, cf. Eph. 2:1; Col. 2:13. c) Rom. 5:16, 18, through one transgression there resulted condemnation to all men.
d) Eph. 4:17, they walk, in the futility of their mind; Tit. 1:15.
5) We believe that it is, therefore, utterly beyond the power and the desire of fallen man to understand the things of Goda, to seek Himb, to keep His commandmentsc, to embrace the Gospeld, to repent of sine, or to trust in Christf; and that these are, nevertheless, the very things God justly requires of himg.

6) We believe that God, in Christa, before the foundation of the worldb and for His own gloryc, did elect an innumerable host of men and womend to eternal life as an act of His gracee and an expression of His lovef; and that this election was in no way dependent upon His foresight of their faithg, decisionh, worksi, or meritj.

a) Eph. 1:4, 6.
b) Eph. 1:4; 2 Thess. 2:13, God has chosen you from the beginning.
c) Eph. 1:6, 12, 14, to the praise of His glory.
d) Gen. 15:5; cf. Gal. 3:16, 29; Rev. 5:9, from every tribe and tongue and people and nation.
e) 2 Tim. 1:9, according to His own purpose and grace. f) Eph. 1:4-5, in love He predestined us; 2:4, because of His great love with which He loved us; 1 Jhn. 4:19.
g) Acts 13:48.
h) Jhn 1:13, nor of the will of the flesh; Rom. 9:16.
i) Eph. 2:8-9; 2 Tim. 1:9; Tit. 3:5.
j) Rom. 9:10-13; Eph. 1:6, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved.
The Person and Work of Christ

7) We believe that Christ was sent into the world by His heavenly Fathera; that He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spiritb in the womb of the virgin Maryc, and born of her, yet without sind; that He lived a sinless lifee, perfectly fulfilling the law of Godf; that He was and is both fully mang and fully Godh in two distinct naturesi, and one Person foreverj; that as man, he is our elder brotherk and High Priestl before Godm, representing us to God the Fathern; and that as God, He is the visible image of the invisible Fathero, representing God to usp.

a) Acts 3:22; Jhn. 3:34.
b) Matt. 11:27, nor does anyone know the Father, except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son wills to reveal Him. c) Jhn. 14:26; 16:12-14.
9) We believe that as High Priest, Christ once offered Himself up to Goda on the cross as a substitutionary sacrificeb for the electc, thereby propitiating God’s wrath which was upon themd, procuring their reconciliation with Gode, and redeeming them from the curse of the Lawf; and that He continually intercedes for themg in the presence of His Father in Heavenh, thereby assuring their perseverance in holiness unto the endi.

a) Heb. 7:27.
b) Heb. 10:12; Isa. 53:5; 2 Cor. 5:21.
c) Matt. 1:21, He who will save His people from their sins.
d) Rom. 3:25; Heb. 2:17. e) Rom. 5:10; Eph. 2:16, reconcile them both . . . to God; Col. 1:21-22.
f) Gal. 3:13; Eph. 1:7; Col. 2:14.
g) Heb. 7:25.
h) Rom. 8:34.
i) 1 Cor. 1:8; Jude 24f.
10) We believe that as King, Christ was declared the Son of God with power by His bodily resurrection from the dead on the third daya; that, having in this way conquered His enemiesb, He ascended to the right hand of the Father and was enthroned in glory, thus inaugurating His Heavenly Kingdomc; that He poured out His Spirit on the day of Pentecost to carry forward His work on earthd; that He rules in the hearts of His peoplee, subduing their sinf and enabling them to love and obey Himg; and that He rules over all creation, visible and invisibleh, for their sakei.

11) We believe that God the Son has sent forth the Holy Spirita to apply the sacrifice of Christ to the electb by convincing them of their sin and miseryc, enlightening their minds in the knowledge of Christd, and renewing their willse, thus persuading and enabling them to embrace Jesus Christ salvifically through faith alonef, whom has been freely offered to them in the Gospelg; and that this work of the Spirit, variously called regenerationh, renewali, or rebirthj is equivalent in this New Covenant economy with that work of the Spirit designated in the Scriptures as baptism “with the Holy Spirit”k and is thus the common experience of all believersl.

a) Jhn. 16:7, I will send Him to you.
b) Tit. 3:4-7.
c) Jhn. 16:8.
d) Jhn. 16:13-14; Acts 16:14, the Lord opened her heart to respond to the things spoken; 1 Cor. 2:10.
e) Ezek. 36:26; Phil. 2:13.
f) Gen 15:6; Jn. 1:12-13; 3:15-18,36; 5:24; 6:28-29; 6:35,47; Acts 16:30-31; Eph. 2:8-9; Rom. 3:28; 4:5; 5:1-2; 10:4; 10:9-10; 11:6; Phil: 3:9; Titus 3:5; 2 Tim. 1:12. g) Ps. 110:3. h) Tit. 3:5, the washing of regeneration.
i) 2 Cor. 5:17, a new creature.
j)John 3:3; 1 Pet. 1:3.
k)Mark 1:8; Acts 1:5; Eph. 4:5.
l) 1 Cor. 12:13; Eph. 1:13.
12) We believe that the elect, having been brought to faith by the ministry of the Spirita, are justifiedb (that is, pardoned of all their sinsc and declared righteous in the sight of Godd) on the sole basis of Christ’s righteousness imputed to theme; that, although sin may interrupt the joy of their fellowship with Godf and bring upon them the loving discipline of their Heavenly Fatherg, they are never more nor less justified than when they first believedh; and that all the elect, both those before Christ’s first advent and those after, are justified in the same manneri.

a) Acts 18:27; Gal. 4:6, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts; Phil. 1:29.
b) Rom. 3:24.
c) Eph. 1:7.
d) Rom. 4:5; 2 Cor. 5:21.
e) Rom. 5:18-19; Phil. 3:9. f) Ps. 51:12; 2 Cor. 7:9.
g) 1 Cor. 11:29-32; Heb. 12:7-10.
h) Rom. 8:1.
i) Gen. 15:6, cf. Gal. 3:9; Hab. 2:4, cf. Rom. 1:17; Gal. 3:11.
13) We believe that those who are thus justified are also adopted as God’s own childrena and made joint heirs with Christb; that they are given the Holy Spirit as the guarantee of their redemptionc through Whom they cry out, “Abba! Father!”d; and that they shall, therefore, bear the fruit of the Spirite throughout the remainder of their livesf.

a) Gal. 4:5-6.
b) Rom. 8:17.
c) Eph. 1:13-14. d) Rom. 8:15.
e) Ezek. 36:27; Gal. 5:22-23; Eph. 2:10.
f) Rom. 8:35-37, in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer;
2 Cor. 2:14.
14) We believe that the Spirit indwells all true believersa and works in them, by means of the Scripturesb, that which is pleasing in His sightc; that, having freed them from the power of sind, He conforms them into the image of Christe and enables them more and more to die unto sin and live unto righteousnessf; and that, nevertheless, due to their remaining corruption, this process is never perfected in this life but rather gives rise to a continual war (the flesh striving against the Spirit and the Spirit striving against the fleshg), which shall continue until Christ takes them home in glory and frees them from the presence of sinh.

a) Rom. 8:14.
b) Acts 20:32; 1 Pet. 1:23.
c) Rom. 7:4, that we might bear fruit for God.
d) Rom. 6:17-18. e) Rom. 8:29.
f) Rom. 8:13, by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body.
g) Gal. 5:17; 1 Pet. 2:11.
h) Rom. 8:23.
15) We believe that those who profess faitha yet exhibit a pattern of life governed by sin are self-deceivedb and are still in a lost conditionc.

16) We believe that God has maintained one eternal purpose in Christa which has been expressed through a multiplicity of distinct historical covenantsb; that prominent among thesec are those designated the Old Covenant (also known as the Mosaic or First Covenantd) and the New Covenante; that the former, confined to the people of Israel alonef, was established while that nation was assembled before Mt. Sinaig and was later made obsoleteh through its fulfillment by the life and death of Jesus the Messiahi; that it was comprised wholly of shadowsj pointing ultimately to Jesus and His body, the Churchk; and that, therefore, the age in which it remained operative was at all times a period of immaturityl as compared to the age of fulfillment which was inaugurated with Christ’s first adventm.

a) Eph. 3:11.
b) Eph. 2:12, the covenants of promise; Rom. 9:4.
c) Gal 4:24, these are two covenants.
d) Heb. 8:7; 9:1.
e) Heb 8:13; Luke 22:20.
f) Deut. 5:3.
g) Deut. 5:2-3; 1 Kings 8:9; Gal. 3:17, the Law, which came four hundred and thirty years later, i.e., at Sinai. h) Luke 5:36-38; Heb. 8:13, cf. 7:12; 2 Cor. 3:6-11, esp. v. 11, that which fades away; Gal. 3:19, it was added . . . until the seed should come.
i) Eph. 2:14-15; Matt. 5:17, I did not come to abolish, but to fulfill; Rom. 8:3; 10:4.
j) Col. 2:16-17; Heb. 10:1.
k) Heb. 11:9-10, [Abraham] lived as an alien in a land of promise . . . for he was looking for the city which has foundations, whose architect and builder is God.
l) Gal. 3:23-25; 4:3.
m) Matt. 1:22; 2:17; 4:14, etc., note the repeated, this was to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet.
17) We believe that the Old Covenant, containing a single, unified law codea, was a legal, conditional covenantb requiring perfect and complete obedience of all those under itc; that, on the one hand, it promised life to all who obeyed itd, and, on the other hand, it pronounced a curse upon all its transgressorse; that it, therefore, inescapably brought death to all who sought to be justified by itf — not because of a deficiency in the law (itself “holy, just, and good”g), but because of the sinful inability of those under its chargeh; and that, for this reason, it is variously described as a “killing letter,”i a “ministry of death,”j and a “ministry of condemnation”k– its distinct purpose being to illumine sinl so as to make manifest the Israelites’ and, by implication, all men’s need for a redeemerm.

a) Heb. 8:9, not like the covenant which I made with their fathers.
b) Rom. 5:19.
c) Gal. 3:13.
d) Heb. 7:22.
e) Heb. 13:20. f) Heb. 8:6.
19) We believe that, under the New Covenant, God’s people, having entered the age of fulfillmenta, now stand as mature sonsb; that having been set freec from the tutelage and bondage of the law coded written upon tablets of stonee, they have subsequently been placed under the Spirit’s managementf — having the new and greater Lawgiver’sg own lawh now written upon their heartsi.

a) 1 Cor. 10:11.
b) Gal. 4:4-7.
c) Acts 13:39; Gal. 5:1; Rom. 8:2.
d) Rom. 6:14; 7:6; Gal. 3:25.
e) Deut. 4:13. f) Rom. 7:6, we serve in newness of the Spirit, 8:14.
g) Heb. 3:3, counted worthy of more glory than Moses.
h) Isa. 42:4; Heb. 7:12.
i) Jer. 31:33; cf. Heb. 8:10; 2 Cor. 3:3.
20) We believe that, as a result, though many of the individual commandments given in the decalogue and the eternal principles upon which the Mosaic Covenant was founded still apply to those under the New Covenanta, God’s people are now totally free from the Old Covenant as a covenantb; that the usefulness of the Mosaic commands is not therefore to be denied, only that these are now understood to come to us through Christc, the mediator of the New Covenantd; and that, in particular, with the obsolescence of the Old Covenant, the fourth commandment, the seventh day Sabbath observance, is no longer obligatorye — its relevance now pointing to that rest enjoyed by all those in Christf.

21) We believe that the universal Church is the continuationa of the historical people of God whom, in Abrahamc, God chose to Himself from all peoplesd and to whom He bound Himself by making the covenants and the promisese; that it, therefore, consists only of those who have been justified by faithf; that it alone is rightfully designated the body of Christg, a chosen race, a kingdom of priests, a holy nation, and a people for God’s own possessionh; and that it shall flourishi despite persecution and strife unto the end of the agej.

a) Rom. 4:22-24.
c) Gal. 3:8.
d) Rom. 4:9-12; Rev. 5:9, men from every tribe and tongue and people and nation.
e) Rom. 1:2f. f) Rom. 4:13, 24; 5:1; Gal. 3:7, 9; Jer. 31:34; Joel 3:17, So Jerusalem shall be holy, and strangers will pass through it no more; Zech. 14:21.
g) Eph. 1:22-23; Col. 1:18, 24.
h) Tit. 2:14; 1 Pet. 2:9.
i) Eph. 1:11-12; 2 Tim. 2:9, the word of God is not imprisoned; Isa. 11:9.
j) Matt. 16:18; Heb. 12:28, a kingdom which cannot be shaken; Dan. 2:44.
22) We believe that the local church is ultimately under the authority of Christ alonea; that its purpose is to glorify Godb and enjoy Him forever through the pure preaching of the Wordc, the proper administration of the gospel ordinancesd, and the diligent exercise of church disciplinee; that it has been commissioned by Christ to proclaim the Gospel to all menf, being assured that God will not cast out anyg who come to Him in true faith and repentanceh; that its membership is to be composed only of those who have professed faith in Christi and who live lives in accordance with that professionj; that it is to be governed by a plurality of eldersk (when possible) who share an equality of authorityl; and that it is, consistent with the communion of the saintsm, to recognize and fellowship with all members of Christ’s Bodyn.

a) Eph. 1:22; 2:20.
b) Eph. 5:12.
c) 1 Tim. 4:6, constantly nourished on the words of the faith, 13.
d) Acts 2:42.
e) 1 Cor. 5:7, Clean out the old leaven; Tit. 3:10.
f) Matt. 28:19-20.
g) John 6:37. h) Rom. 10:13.
i) 1 Cor. 1:2; Col. 1:2.
j) 1 Cor. 5:11; 2 Cor. 6:14f.; 2 Thess. 3:6.
k) note the plural elders in Acts 20:17; Tit. 1:5; and 1 Pet. 5:1.
l) elders, and overseers – used interchangeably; Acts 20:17, 28 — are all given the responsibility to shepherd, i.e., pastor, the church of God, Acts 20:28.
m) 1 Cor. 10:17, we who are many are one body.
n) Gal. 6:10; 1 Thess. 4:9; 1 Jhn. 3:14-18.
23) We believe that, though there are many gifts in the Body of Christa, there is only one Spirit who bestows them allb, and that they are therefore to be used for the building up of the Churchc and not for personal gratificationd; that the Church, having been built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophetse, is no longer dependent upon the miraculous and revelatory gifts which were present at its inceptionf; that, though God is capable of intervening today with a miraculous eventg, the miraculous gifts, as gifts, have passed awayh, their significancei having now ceased; that, with the completion of the New Testament canon, revelatory gifts have also ceasedj; and that, of these, tongues (known languages foreign to their speakerk) signaled the fulfillment of Old Testament propheciesl foretelling the divine judgment against Israelm in the transition from the Old era to the New.

25) We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ shall come again (personally and premillennially) in order to establish His messianic Kingdom for a thousand years on the eartha. We believe that this time of our Lord’s reign will be characterized by harmony, justice, peace, righteousness, and long lifeb. We believe that following the release of Satan after the thousand year reign of Christc, Satan will deceive the nations of the earth and gather them to battle against the Saints at which time Satan and his army will be devoured by fire from heavend. Following this, Satan will be thrown into the lake of fire and brimstonee whereupon Christ, Who is the judge of all menf, will resurrect and judge the great and small at the Great White Throne judgmentg. We believe that after the closing of the millennium, the temporary release of Satan, and the judgement of unbelieversh, the saved will enter the eternal state of glory with God, after which the elements of this earth are to be dissolvedi and replaced with a new earth wherein only righteousness dwellsj. Following this, the heavenly city will descend from Heavenk and will become the dwelling place of the saints, where they will enjoy everlasting fellowship with God and with one anotherl. Our Lord Jesus Christ, having fulfilled His redemptive mission, will then deliver up the kingdom to God the Fatherm. in order that in all spheres, the Triune God may reign forever and evern.